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Enric Miralles + Benedetta Tagliabue

collage monograph

S.Buell | Collage+Architecture | Spring 2011

Enric Miralles + Benedetta Tagliabue

A collage is a document that fixes a thought in a place, but it fixes it in a vague way, deformed and deformable; it fixes a reality in order to be able to work with it. When we turn a pocket inside out, the objects fall and we gather them. -E. Miralles

In 1992, Enric Miralles and Benedetta Tagliabue joined to create their namesake firm, EMBT. Their collage and photomontage work was an integral part of their partnerships design development. The built and paper projects resonate with the theme of juxtaposing disparate elements of a place through the actions of excavation, addition, and reconfiguration. A study of Enric Miralles (and later, EMBTs) collages reveals a development of his representational methods and means. Although the methods have evolved, a few constants have remained: First, the importance of manipulation of the perimeter of a composition is a persistent theme. These collages, like a puzzle, represent a space in a way that repeats the process of making a project itself. They are like a surprise, continually offering new definitions of the limits and contours. Benedetta Tagliabue reflects on the beginnings of the cut-outs of the firm: The very first cut-outs, around 1990, were done simply to eliminate an unwanted background. But later the scissors became a kind of liberating tool, creating the illusion that the building, in its final, constructed form, could still be worked on, varied. They seemed to bring the projects back to the drawing board. Second, there is an insistent curiosity about perspective, point of view, and simultaneity in the collages. The destabilization of perspective through panoramic assemblages and unsuspected adjacencies recur over the years. The multiplicity of their photomontages as an assemblage of views is described as, aim[ing] to fix, in a single view, all the different images which accompany the eye as it moves along the profiles and sections. They attempt to explain a complete and simultaneous kind of perception, to convey all knowledge contained in all the drawings and perspectives of a project. This monograph traces the lineage of the collage work of Enric Miralles, from his beginnings in the late 1970s through his collaboration with Benedetta Tagliabue (EMBT), and until his death in 2000. Today, Benedetta Tagliabue still practices in Barcelona, and continues to use collage and photomontage as a method of exploring design.

S.Buell | Collage+Architecture | Spring 2011

Background + Overview

[ BT ] [ E M ]
Tagliabue Miralles
Born in Milan 1963

1955: Born in Barcelona 1974: Graduated from ETSAB (Escuela Tcnica Superior de Arquitectura de Barcelona) 1978-1987: Works as an apprentice for Pion and Vallaplana in Barcelona 1987: Presented his doctoral thesis, Things seen to the Right and Left (Without Glasses)

Graduated from the University of Venice 1989

1987-1989: Collaboration with Carme Pins 1990: Begins working as director and professor of the Master Class at Stdelschule of Frankfurt

Joined Enric Miralles Studio Took leadership of EMBT

1991: Began working with Benedetta Tagliabue,

Served at the Kenzo Tange Chair professor at Harvard

2000: His death was met with a flurry of publications and accolades

Igualada Cemetary 1985-1996 [EM]

Scottish Parliament 2004 [EM]BT

Scottish Parliament 2004 [EM]BT

Mercat Santa Catalina 1997-2005 [EM]BT

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perspectival beginnings: 1976Miralles focus on perspective and fragmentation evidenced his doctoral research. In his thesis, he discusses drawing as a collection of fragments. He describes the making of the drawings as, the beginning of the dialogue between thought and construction. Although line drawings, the perspectives explore fragments of other buildings to make space and the transparency of these pieces. In the drawings, the transparency is literal, not phenomenal. His focus appears to be on the creation of absence through layering. He also employed the use of photocopies (figure 1) to explore the distance between the immediacy of drawing and the creation of an image. Now these drawings are cuttings from photocopies; I try to see them as though for the first time: they are enlargements that distance themselves from the hand, from the curving arch of the wrist, articulations whose movement is repeated continuously in drawing (no matter how much one tries to get away from them). He compares his thesis to the enthusiastic awareness of eighteenth century travelers, in whom active contemplation is conflated with creation. This kind of active contemplation aligned with creation also describes his collage making.

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figure 2.

Igualada Cemetary 1985-1996

The Igualada Cemetary project began with the partnership of Miralles with Carme Pins. However, the project took eleven years (1985-1996) to complete, and in that time, Pins left Miralles and Tagliabue became a partner. Much of the work was completed in 1985 and 1986, but the chapel was designed five years after the first phase of construction. The design of the chapel marks the beginning of Miralles use of photomontage. Using photographs of the completed project, Miralles revisited his work by cutting into the images. Miralles said, In this way we returned to the initial character of the building, tying together the distant stages of beginning and end, re-establishing the direct relationship that exists almost independently of the development of the work. Tagliabue states, Within this framework, the built work is not the main stage of the architectonic process, but simply another stage. The cut-out images of the cemetery are single pieces of paper, with the negative space that surrounds the perimeter becoming a collaged element (figures 2,3). Although some may require collage to be two or more elements juxtaposed, these cut-outs use varied perimeters to engage the negative space in more than one way, therefore becoming collages. Beyond the profile of the hills, the space is infinite, while at the bottom of the compositions the negative space is foregrounded, almost becoming an object itself.

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Osthaven Port Project 1992

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The photomontages attempt to recapture the existence of the other river bank, the immaterial presence of other places, images of streets, windows of city dwellings: what exists and what could exist. The use of photomontage and drawing fragments in the representation of the Osthaven Port Project reveals the importance of excavating the ground in the project. A comparison of two collages produced for the project reveals the use of photomontage as a means for understanding figure and ground in relation to the projects context. In figure 5, the photos constitute the foreground of the proposal, the design, as well as the panoramic context. In figure 6, the photos play a different role, they inhabit the negative space of the water, adding context to what was blank in the first collage. This interplay between what is added, subtracted, covered and uncovered allows for the designs details to remain ambiguous.

Bremerhaven 1993
EMBTs use of photomontage as a ground for drawing fragments is used in the Bremerhaven Port Reuse Competition Proposal. The collages foreground juxtaposed plans, elevations, and sections with fragmented images beyond (figure 3). The photomontages are used as a contextual ground, while the placement and scale of the drawing fragments exhibit the generative aspects of the studies. Our response was to superimpose a temporal complexity on this unique place with a series of narrative proposals. In a later model of the project, photomontage is used in a more conventional way, with the perimeter becoming less irregular than the previous drawings and operating more as a taciturn base for the articulate model (figure 4). Although the photomontage of this model is more reserved than the base of the previous collages, it is not silent. The perimeter is carefully trimmed, sometimes tracing the bulwarks of the canal, and other times shearing through nearby buildings, bringing attention to certain edge conditions important to the project. As a note, the photomontages predate digital automation and are arranged by hand with developed photographs. Therefore, the act of making the collages is different than the ubiquitous means of making panoramas with scripts on a computer. This analog type of making hearkens back to how Miralles described the drawings he created for his doctoral thesis, the beginning of the dialogue between thought and construction.

figure 3.

figure 4.

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Saragossa Museum of Contemporary Art 1994

Similarly, the method of using photomontage as a panoramic ground for drawing fragments is used in the representation of the Proposal for the Saragossa Museum of Contemporary Art (1994). Miralles describes the spaces of the project: These spaces slide in front of existing neighborhood constructions. The outline of this complex of spaces is confused with that of the city. This can be seen on the right side of figure 7, where the drawing fragments move between the negative space and the photomontage. On the left side of the composition, multiple views of the same a model are strung together, revealing a non-perspectival view of the context. The coincident presence of a panorama and a birds eye view in this collage reveal the firms curiosity about simultaneous perception. These montages aim to make one forget the ways of representing and thinking about the physical reality of things characteristic of the perspectival tradition. In a certain sense, they are like simultaneous sketches, like multiple and distinct visions of one single moment. He continues, A collage is a document that fixes a thought in a place, but it fixes it in a vague way, deformed and deformable; it fixes a reality in order to be able to work with it.

figure 8.

Hostalets Civic Center Project 1990

In the Hostalets Civic Center Project in Baleny, Spain, photomontage is used to document the construction process (figure 8). These partial, lateral views constitute a process parallel to the growing stimulus to compile the documentation produced by a project. In addition, these deformations have the capacity to render the content of the projects explicit. EMBT seems moved to make sense of the photographic evidence of construction while compelled by the dialogue between the generative nature of the arrangement of the indexical photographs.

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figure 10.

Rome Parochial Center Proposal 1994

For EMBT, Photomontage is often an arrangement of photographs of a place, with the constituent elements of the collage taken from the same location. However, in the Rome Parochial Center Competition (1994), the collages are of a different nature. The collages are used to explore the idea of the building as a continuous circle, or an animal eating its tail. This is explored with the assembly of unrelated images. In figure 9, a fish is placed on the site, scaled to the building, resembling the form, but bringing its own set of meanings. In figure 10, bread, beans, feet, and a glass are composed on an image of the site. The proposal was not accepted, and furthermore, the organization never contacted the firm again.

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Buggerru Tourist Village Project 1994

In the photomontages for the Osthafen Port Reuse Competition and Hostalets Civic Center Project, the module of the printed photograph guides the perimeter of the composition. However, in the Buggerru Tourist Village Project in Sardinia (1994), the images that are used as the ground begin to act as texture rather than panorama and the perimeter of the composition is dramatically modified from the orthogonal module of the photographic print (figure 11). This may be the next step in the evolution of the collages produced by the firm, or may also be because of the nature of the projects. While the Osthafen and Hostalets projects are urban infill projects, the Buggerru project is rural, with the an undulating landscape being the primary ground for design.

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International Garden Fair in Dresden 1995

In the proposal for the International Garden Fair in Dresden (1995), photomontage brings into question its role as representation or as design. The photomontage in figure 12 illustrates the modeling approach of using flower petals as a means for developing the design. Are the photographs representing the model a the primary mode of design development, or is the photomontage crucial to the design as well? This is similar to the question of a record of performance art. Is the performance the art piece, or is the record the art piece?

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Heaven installation 1994-1995

The heaven installation at Tateyama Park-Museum in Japan (1994-1995), reveals a collage-like fascination with layering and multiplicity. The project, comprised of of suspended copper serpentine bands, investigates the density of light and shadow through layering. The dynamism and multiplicity of this type of layering can parallel EMBTs approach to collage and design.

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figure 14.

Prado Museum Extension Competition 1995

The representations of the Prado Musem Extension Competition in Madrid (figures 14, 15) appear to provide a foil to the Dreseden International Garden Fair Proposal (Figure 12). The collages use images of gardens and a constructed model to represent the design. In this case, the model is not only being represented, but reconfigured. Unlike the proposal for the Garden Fair in Dresden, the photographs of the model are trimmed, reconfigured, rescaled in respect to one another. The multiplicity of views, from almost planar to birds eye exhibits a conscious rethinking of the model.

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Chemnitz Sports Center 1995

Similar to the Prado Museum Extension (figures 14, 15), the reconfiguration of conventional architectural representation through photomontage is evident in the representation of the Chemnitz Sports Center (figure 16). Rather than presented as a singular drawing, the representation is fractured into modules similar to printed photographs. These modules are loosely assembled, destabilizing otherwise continuous lines and questioning the parts to whole relationship of a perspectival rendering.

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figure 17.

figure 19.

Thessalonoki Bay Maritime Station 1996

The plan collage of the Thessalonoki Bay Maritime Station (figure 17) is yet another variation on the use of photomontage. Like the contextual representation of the Bremerhaven Port Reuse Competition model (figure 4), photography is used as the base of the model. However, unlike this Bremerhaven model, the images are not planar, but rather panoramic, showing 360 degrees of vision from the end of a pier. Like the Bremerhaven representation, the addition of thick materials brings the collage closer to a model than a two-dimensional composition. The interplay of the photomontage and light is caused by the shadows from the suspension of string above the substrate. This three dimensionality of a linear gesture resonates in the architecture of earlier projects, such as the Takaoka Station Access (figure 18), the Unazuki Meditation Pavilion (figure 19).

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New Reale Theater 1996

figure 21.

In the proposal for the New Reale Theater in Copenhagen, (1996) the collage produced exhibits EMBTs interest in context as well as the introduction of new techniques to their collage making. Miralles states, It is necessary to respect the rich urban context of this crossroads site before beginning to weave a new theater into the city. The collage illustrates a type of crossroads, or a nexus of two almost-perpendicular paths. The use of collage to illustrate a designed perspective in an almost pictoral way is new in the collection of work (figure 20). Unlike previous projects, like the Hostalets Civic Center construction, photomontage was used to document existing perspectives, or reconfigured images to construct a birds eye representations. The most similar representation to this collage is the Osthaven vignettes that use drawing fragments on an existing panoramic photomontage. In addition, the perimeter of the Copenhagen collage is cropped to a rectangle, unlike many of the other photomontages where the perimeter is determined by the positioning of the modules of individual photographs. Although the materials and means of the collage are not detailed, the transparency and repetition of constituent pieces of the collage suggest that digital means may have been used. Unlike previous analog collages, the flattening and repetition of the scale figures compared with the texture of the overlapping photographs on the left side of the composition suggest a new type of experimentation with a variety of media. This introduction of digital means to representation is also evident in the illustration of the interior of the theater (figure 21). Similarly, the view is cropped to a rectangle, and the contextual background is a digital rendering, as exhibited by the light patterns on the left wall, pixel-like resolution, and CYMK coloration of the sculptural elements.

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figure 23.

Enric Miralles + Benedetta Tagliabue

figure 22. The new reale theater is one of the last completed projects by Enric Miralles before his death. Although the Scottish parliament and the Mercado de Santa Caterina rely heavily on his influence, he did not see their completion. The Scottish parliament project marks Miralles emergence onto the super-architect scene. This commission is linked to a new kind of note taking for Miralles. He adopted larger sketchbooks and glue as traveling companions to more rigorously document his life. The sketchbooks are filled with precise collages and notes, organized for posterity. After Miralles death, Tagliabue took control of the firm, completing the unfinished projects, and continues to drive a successful practice today. Photomontage, although still present in the in desing process of the firm, has moved from physical ubiquity to a broader design approach. In short, after Miralles death, collages do not seem to be made as often. However, collage does remain a generative and representational device for the firm, but the nature of the photomontage has shifted from a more abstracted dialogue between perspective and perimeter to the use of image for its meaning and form. For example, the conceptual collages for the Comic and Animation Museum in China (figure 22) rely heavily on imagery, with color and texture playing a different role than in earlier compositions. Similarly the collage for School of Music in Gandia, Spain (figure 23) uses the imagery of instruments more as a diagram of important urban connections and their programmatic symbolism. The collages appear to be less generative; instead of suspending exactness, they seem demonstrative. Miralles described the distracted gaze as a tool for design: My working method is closely linked to the idea of looking about or being distracted. Once the problem has been set, the next step is to almost forget about the ultimate aim about what you are doing, almost as a means of distractionyou move forward through successive beginnings. This monograph focuses on the beginnings of the collage work of the firm EMBT as traced back to the early work of Enric Miralles. There is some significance of the continuity of collages before Tagliabue joined forces with Miralles and the discontinuity of the collage making after his death. Although Benedetta undoubtedly had a significant influence on the collage process, Enric Miralles approach to photomontage and its influence on his design thinking is unique.

Enric Miralles + Benedetta Tagliabue

Sources: EMBT 2000-2009: Enric Miralles Bendetta Tagliabue, Afterlife in progress El Croquis, 144 (2009) EMBT: Enric Miralles Bendetta Tagliabue Arquitectes Associats Accessed March 3, 2012. http://www.mirallestagliabue.com/ EMBT Miralles Tagliabue AA: Arquitecturas de Autor, (2006) EMBT 1983-2000 El Croquis, 100-101 (2002) Miralles, Enric and Bendetta Tagliabue, Enric Miralles: Mixed Talks (New York: Academy Editions, 1995) Tagliabue, Bendetta and Enric Miralles, Enric Miralles: Works and Projects, 1975-1995 (New York: Montacelli Press, 1996) Zabalbeascoa, Anatxu and Javier Rodrguez Marcos, Ed, Mirrales Tagliabue, Time Architecture (Corte Madera, CA: Ginko Press, 1999)

S.Buell | Collage+Architecture | Spring 2011